What cheap modern items can I use to bribe medieval people?

Question

Inspired by this question about a time traveller.

So, I've travelled to the medieval age. Think 12th / 13th century Europe. Unlike the time traveller in the other question, I did bring batteries for my time machine, but I want to have some fun while I'm here.

So I need to impress the locals with some gifts to get them to do things I'd like to see them do. I thought about bringing bolts of silk and sacks of spices. Unfortunately, I spent all my money on my time machine. So I need some suggestions. Here are my criteria:

• Must be interesting and valuable to medieval people, enough so that they'd at least give me free food and lodging in exchange, and maybe put on some shows and generally give me a good tourist experience.
• Should not have a very large impact on medieval society. I'm not trying to cause a technological revolution here.
• In our time, it should be within the means of the average person to afford - the cheaper and more common it is, the better!
• Ideally should not leave lasting archaeological evidence. So, no plastic bags or running shoes.

Answer 1

Rubber No seriously a cheap waterproof rain slicker or pair of rubber boots will bribe the average person very easily, waterproof materials were nonexistent. It is also really easy to demonstrate and you can buy them at a dollar store. The best they had at the time were merely water resistant materials which tended to stain since they were soaked in oil. Plus there is no risk of accused of black magic like you might with medicine or any other active chemical. Plus it will rot away in a few decades so no evidence, as long as you don't pass out hundreds of them.

Nails Nails were valuable enough to be major market item becasue they were time consuming to make. But at the same time, they were common enough that anyone would recognize and want them. Small furniture nails were even more valuable. A box of nails both valuable AND easy to fraction out (20 nails for a piece of whatever I smell cooking), and would not draw that much attention, since they did exist. you can buy square/box nails at any large hardware store, The process is different but the finished project will be identical.

Salt is just easy its desirable and easy to come by, sea salt is considered more desirable, spices are more tricky. You could easily be accused of selling poison or being a smuggler or get your friends accused of the same.

Cotton Go buy a few bolts of cotton cloth from Walmart. You can trade each one for a month of food and shelter without much problem. Go with tan or off-white to reduce suspicion. Remember: you don't want to give out too much wealth because it just makes those people a target. Cotton was known at the time, but it was traded from India at a high cost. Just buy "all natural" or unbleached cotton.

Wooden dice Easy to carry, dice were common, boredom is universal and you can buy them at any craft store cheap.

Sewing needles Light, easy to carry, you can buy them at Walmart by the hundreds for pocket change and everyone in the medieval society will see their value. Go with big over small however, the cloth of the time was rough spun.

Combs Even metal combs are cheap, pretty, and combs are universal so that anyone with hair will see their value. Just get simple designs and any archaeological evidence will be too corroded to look out of place.

Mink oil made of mink oil and lanolin is used to waterproof leather. Waterproofing would always have been valuable at the time and both ingredients were available and used. They were just a pain in the ass to get in any quantity. Heck, you could just buy a tub of lanolin at any fabric store - years worth of work in one tub!

As Zwol mentioned many goods had monopolies or defacto monopolies (guilds, charters, patents, ect) in certain countries so you could get your friends in serious trouble, so far as I know none of these had monopolies at the time although some did develop ones several centuries later. This is also why I left things like purple dye off the list they were far more restricted and not something you want your friends to be caught with.

For more ideas, I recommend the video series "worst jobs in history" to get an idea of what was valuable at the time.

Answer 2

There are a few options:

1. Aluminum. Until modern times, it was essentially impossible to produce in any significant quantity, making it far, far, far more valuable than gold. It is also a useful metal in its own right, being strong and light. And it should break down within 500 years, so it won't leave any archeological evidence in the modern day. Price: free if you are willing to dig around in some trash cans.
2. Candles. The candles affordable to medieval people were very smelly, and odorless candles were too expensive. Price: About 20 dollars for a box of 100 small candles or 12 big ones.
3. Paper. Paper at the time was made from rags, and thus much more expensive. They probably wouldn't have much use for it themselves, but the nearest monastery would appreciate it, and the village would be eager to impress the Church. It won't last long, though, especially if you pick low-quality paper that degrades quickly. Early paper used cloth or animal skins that last much longer than modern wood pulp paper, especially cheap paper. It will seem good as long as you are there, but won't last a century not to mention 6-7 centuries. Price: About 20 dollars for a box of 5000 sheets.
4. Salt. Salt was extremely important part of the diet that was hard to come by for most people for most of history. It was also critical for preserving food. Price: About 20 dollars for a 25 pound bag.
5. Spices. Also critical for preserving food, but had to be imported from Asia and India. The crusades were largely fought over disruptions to the spice trade. Price: less than 5 dollars for a 5 ounce bag, probably good for dozens of meals.
6. Dyes. The cheap synthetic clothing dyes didn't exist, and several colors (particularly blue, purple, and some shades of red) were extremely expensive to make. Price: about 20 dollars for a small kit with various colors.
7. Silk. Although still more expensive today than other fabrics, it is much, much, much cheaper than it was due to modern western silk production. Price: Less than 15 dollars for a silk shirt.
8. Fertilizer. You can buy it by the carloads and it would have helped their agriculture immensely, although getting them to recognize its advantages may take some time. Price: Less than 15 dollars for a decent-size bag.
9. Pesticide (thanks Richard U). Would likely work much more quickly than fertilizer and is even more important. Price: Less than 40 dollars for a large bag of insecticide and less than 30 dollars for a large tub of rat/mouse poison.
10. Perfume. Apparently at the time bathing was not popular in northern Europe, perfume was used instead. Price: You can easily get a probably several month supply for less than 15 dollars or air freshener for less than a dollar, although you would need to transfer it to some container than is appropriate for the era.
11. Incense. Another thing that was used more in churches, but again pleasing the Church is always a good thing in medieval Europe. Price: less than 15 dollars for several months worth.

Answer 3

Peppercorns. Lots and lots of peppercorns. During the middle ages they were as valuable as (if not more so than) gold, whereas today they are one of the cheapest spices you can buy, giving them the highest yield on your investment. Similarly, salt was very valuable, though you would have more luck with that one if you went back to the Roman ages; during the late middle ages salt was still valuable, but much of the Roman empire's infrastructure was built to facilitate the transport of salt to Rome.

If you just wanted to mess with the natives, might I recommend a wrist-mounted fireball launcher? Convincing them you are a wizard who can incinerate them with a gesture could be a very effective method of getting them to do what you want.

Answer 4

Deodorant

True story: my brother, on his second tour as an Infantry officer in Iraq, asked for a box of deodorant in the mail. Turns out, everybody wants it. Village elders want it, housewives want it, kids want it. This stuff is pretty amazing when you think about. Makes you smell nice all day. People paid a lot of money for perfumes in the Middle Ages. For dirt cheap you can give them some smellgood that really works.

You'll probably want to get the deodorant out of the plastic tubes and into something more biodegradable, but that doesn't make it any less useful.

Answer 5

Sugar

People are nuts for the stuff.

Sugar was viewed in the Medieval period as a medicinal item. That it tasted good and could be turned into various forms such as syrups and pills was a great advantage and it also helped to counteract the bitterness of some of the medicines in which it was an ingredient. It wasn't until the 18th century that sugar ceased to be considered as a drug and a spice and became a basic staple of daily life.

It was also fairly expensive, with a small bag of it being equivalent to a day's wages.

Answer 6

Nails -- These were hard to make -- A box of 5000 would be a good bribe for certain groups, especially smiths for shoeing horses (although this may require specialty nails)

Nail usage in the middle ages

Answer 7

Simple drugs, such as Ibuprofen.

Cheap presbyopia glasses. They are sold on the street for a couple of Euros in several Balkan countries and though not fitting the person exactly, would still be invaluable to them. It would be very hard to remake them, even if you get a pair. No need to fear causing a technical revolution (which rules out clocks, the dissembling of which would probably cause a lot of innovation). They were invented some time before 1286, but still very expensive.

EDIT: There is this painting by Conrad von Soest, from AD 1403 showing the use of spectacles. So the best method would probably be to just give them the lenses - which were the veeery expensive part - and let them fashion a contemporary frame. Alternatively, you could gift them monocles with metal frames.

Cheapest window glass. There was window glass, but it was not affordable.

Shaped glass objects, like a teapot. Glass was blown and thus valuable.

If in a Christian country: tiny printed pictures of saints. The Greek Orthodox Church gifts them to people. They are colourful and saintly and would surely impress them.

Edit: I see that pocket knives and lighters are excluded by the evidence-clause.

Answer 8

Soap.

Rich people had it, but it must have cost way more money than it does now, so just sell that, get gold and make the trip a few times.

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To add some historical facts, see for example this price list:

http://medieval.ucdavis.edu/120D/Money.html

Soap isn't in there, but I think it might still provide a good source also for other answers. And searching for soap in the middle ages does provide sources saying it was a luxury good and used by rich people. No links there because I didn't find a single good source, but many secondary/tertiary/x-iary sources.

Answer 9

1. Colored glass marbles. Glass was a pretty expensive material in Middle Age, only the richest could afford having glass on their window. You could pretend they are like moneys for you. And the natives may use them as pearls.
2. Pyrex Glass bottles. They might have bottles, but yours are heat resistant.
3. Match boxes. For a society relying on fire for heat and light generation, having it at the snap of a finger would be a definite plus.
4. Mirrors (both flat and curved).

Answer 10

Fabric was extremely time intensive to manufacture. Pure white was almost impossible to get in fabric.

You can get six pairs of white athletic socks for $9.99 from Costco. Everybody needs clothes and a clean pair of white socks would be seen as a luxury.

Answer 11

Blue colored fabric would be a very expensive commodity.

Blue was considered a royal color, not because of law, but simply because it was very hard (and thus expensive) to make a good quality dyes. Poor-quality blue dyes where typically made from the woad plant, but this gave a rather pale blue color that has bad resistance to sunlight. A better quality pigment was made from ultramarine, but this needed to be imported from Asia.

Show up with dress like this (not nesecarrily this model, but this color)

and you should be able to catch the attention of the rich quite quickly (because you would be the only person with a fabric this blue).

Any fabric of course nicely fits the requirement that it should not leave lasting archaeological evidence.

Alternatively, you could opt for a bottle of Eau de parfume, an item that could be in the same price range as a nice blue dress, but considerably easier to carry around. It would be harder to simply show off in order to attract the attention of potential buyers

Answer 12

Safety matches

Cheap, small, lightweight, easy to use, obviously useful and they get destroyed as you use them!

Answer 13

Instant ramen noodles. So incredibly cheap: you can get it in most convenience or grocery stores for less than $1.00 per serving, but you would need to transfer the packaging (perhaps place the noodles in a cloth sack, and the flavoring/seasoning oil in a jar). Food is biodegradable so no traces of it will be left behind, and it is valuable as a quicker, cheaper, (and possibly more delicious depending on individual preferences) alternative to pasta/noodles made in the medieval times. This would also have the advantage of being a novelty item, compared to other items that might be cheaper to produce in today's society but aren't necessarily new inventions.

Answer 14

Antibiotics. Not just in the medieval ages, but up to the early XXth century was extremely easy to die of all kind of bacterial diseases and common infections. You can sold a 3$ box for 30000 pieces of silver to your local noble. Once you are famous enough, you can get to treat the king's daughter and maybe you can tourist your own earl or county.

Answer 15

The other answers are great, but tend to focus on luxury items, and items that are valuable because they are scarce at the time.

Hand tools, quality made hand tools would be quite valuable. They will be instantly recognizable and testable by most people you are willing to trade with. Additionally, your potential buyers will actually benefit from these items materially (their work will be made easier), and thus may be more willing to trade. These tools, being useful and only slightly different in design than they alread had, will be worn out and discarded or melted down when they reach the end of their life.

My particular choices

• Estwing Metal Hafted Hammer They come in Many varieties, but this particular one will be tremendously useful to most laborers. The metal haft means they will get many years out of work before it fails. They will love not having to replace the handles.
• Retractable utility knife and blades These blades will be sharper and last longer than any knives that they have. Additionally They can be sharpened, although we never do, and your customers will already know how to do that. Make sure to select a tough body, and one that doesn't require tools that they won't have to change the blades.
• Bow Saw and Blades This one will blow their minds. It is a bow saw that packs down nice and compact. Otherwise, it is valuable for the same reasons as the utility knife. Bring a few extra blades.

Answer 16

Many good answers (spices, fabric, soap, etc) but I have to add a few excellent options

1. Sugar, Chocolate, or any type of candy - 50lbs bag of sugar sells for ~ \$20. Chocolate is more expensive - maybe \$100 - \$150 for 50lbs bag. When sweets became available in Europe, there was a huge craze about them so that would sell for sure.
2. Coffee, tea - again became hugely popular in Europe when they became available
3. Opium - more sinister but could be sold as pain reliever?
4. High quality steel - ulfberht swords were made of high quality Damascus steel and were super sought after so if you are going in to the early middle ages, you are golden.

Answer 17

Potentially Glass Mirrors, you can obtain glass mirrors relatively cheap these days along with a good reflection.

Back in Medieval times Mirrors would not of been too plentiful with only the rich having access to them and certainly not being as big or giving the crisp images as they do these days.

Glass was around in some form or another, and polished metal mirrors have been around since the Bronze Age.

Answer 18

Alcohol and tobacco can be good for bribing.

It can be different kinds of alcohol, for example some strong staff and also some vines and beer. Of course, they had some alcohol drinks, but it's always interesting to try some foreign beverages.

And regarding tobacco, I think they will be interesting in cigarettes, which didn't exist in this time yet.

Answer 19

GOLD

So for some stupid reason this question got stuck in my mind all damn day.. There is an obvious answer that nobody seems to have mentioned mainly due to the pricing however for a couple grams of gold you could have a blast for a while: current prices http://www.apmex.com/spotprices/gold-price/

Also since you're in a time machine you could prolly jump back to before reported findings of gold in some locations and pan for a few days prior to your middle ages trip (unless of course the time machine is limited to only 1 return trip)

Answer 20

Condoms.

Seriously :D They are cheap, you can pack lots of them and it is plausible they was desired goods. Also, latex comdoms should be biodegradable in 50 years (source, source 2) so no surprise for Indiana Jones.

I have no idea whether the medieval church was against limiting reproduction or not, but i doubt it: simply put, they can not be against something that does not yet exist... Anyways, you can just keep yourself under radar or exactly the opposite: you can stick with somebody powerful who does not care much about church & care about not having illegitimate children ;) )

Answer 21

How about glass beads and silver beading wire? Neither are expensive, nor weigh much. They would take very little room and you could sell beads individually or as jewelry.

How about sewing needles? They'd need a larger eye to accommodate the thread of the time. You could also being plans for making simple machines like a treadle sewing machine -- the kind used before electricity. Knowing how to make all those sorts of machines would be useful. How about knowing how to make wooden matches? They were not invented until 1826. Windmills may not have been where your character is at that time.

Answer 22

Pretty picture books. Or paper notebooks. Paper degrades.

Jewelry made from rare and exotic materials (i.e. cheap and small plastic beads that will break in a few decades).

Explosives, like dynamite. You can even hide a 10 year timed fuse inside.

Answer 23

A Catholic Bible or Quran.

Religious books are relatively cheap in present times but in the middle ages, the majority of Bibles were only owned by Churches. Having one in the palm of your hand in would instantly elevate your status to a "Man of God" and grant you the ability to have the "fun" you desire. Trading or selling the Bible to a noble would be very profitable, but conversely, you could potentially overplay the Bible and use it to influence others, depending on your level of morality. (Think "messenger from God")

Now this comes with some risks, due to the church being very curious and powerful, so this would be something you could do for a short time, but might be dangerous to overplay this role too long. Since paper breaks down relatively quickly, I wouldn't expect that a modern Bible would stay intact longer than a few hundred years.

Answer 24

A bucket of "Kernel Sanders" Special recipe

Bet it would go down a treat with some mead.

(Although they might have a bit of an upset tummy for a few days after)

Just an observation I've made when I ate it last....

Answer 25

I would bring back Bic lighters.

Sure, they would leave some archeological traces, but they would never be able to recreate them. You could explain EXACTLY how they worked, so that you wouldn't be seen as a witch and most users would likely try to take it apart to attempt to recreate it, but fail miserably due to the fact that the lighter is made of plastic, held together by a gluing and melting process that could not be mimicked at the time and they wouldn't be able to refill it as they have no access to compressed gas.

Each one would be worth a fortune so you wouldn't have to bring much. I would imagine you could do a grand tour with the value of only 1 lighter.

The metal components of these lighters break down quite fast. I found one in my garden in my backyard and only the plastic remained. The item, when finally disposed of, would likely be a broken pile of plastic bits that archeologists wouldn't even know what it was.

Answer 26

Ballpoint pens. Although not many medieval people could write, the (mostly rich) people who did would certainly be willing to trade for something as usefull as a simple pen. You can get cheap plastic ones for around 10 cents a piece, or biodegradable ones for around $1.50.

Answer 27

Spices - dirt cheap in the UK in large bags from a Chinese supermarket (much cheaper than Tescos/etc.!). Won't arouse suspicion as being an odd item - especially if you pick ones known to them - and would fit with an "I'm a traveller, I picked these up in lands afar" image. Easily portioned out for smaller values. You're unlikely to step on anyone's toes unless you encounter a major merchant. Don't go for salt - one wet day and you risk losing it all if your bag isn't water-tight!

Paper - very valuable in olden times, very cheap now. However, it might arouse some suspicion as to how high quality a modern ream of 80gsm paper is by their standards. You'll need to find the right people to sell it to though, but it could get you quick access to higher society.

Light - once prohibitively expensive, now unnoticeably cheap (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38650976). I suggest reasonable-quality hand-crank torches; they'll last a long time as long as you give them vague guidance not to kick them. Might raise some suspicion as 'magic', but hand-cranked seems safest - people can see that cranking is the energy source, there's no magic demon (lipo cell!) keeping it lit the whole time. Would be an extreme luxury item.

Pins - compared to nails, very cheap and light, but very expensive in the past. Easily portioned out. No risk of being seen as magical/etc. Slight risk of being lynched by the blacksmith!

Answer 28

Fireworks!

go for plain brown paper if possible Light them off, give a great show. Let the local alchemist look at a sample before lighting it off to avoid accusations of witchcraft.

You could entertain the king with a good mortar show, or scare off the kings enemies with stories of a tame dragon and so on. Just make sure you light them all off. Evidence would be burnt and any leftover paper would get scattered and degrade in a pretty short period of time.

Then you could at least let the newly enlightened king in on the concept of bathing regularly and not to dig the privy too close to the well.

Answer 29

Antibiotics. Granted, the Black Death will not be at its peak by then but people will understand the benefits of it...

Must be interesting and valuable to medieval people

Well, you will have to play this right since you have to prove its worth first. This is a major drawback of this technique as you cannot instantly trade it in for the favours. The other issue is (as John's answer suggests) potential trouble with the clergy and other superstitious people. So, yeah, there is a certain risk involved here.

Should not have a very large impact on medieval society. I'm not trying to cause a technological revolution here.

Given the limited supply you will provide and no way to learn the secret of how to make it make it from the mere posession of a few samples, a techological revolution is unlikely. What will happen to the course of history if people survive who would have died otherwise is of course a very different question. Depending on what you think of the butterfly effect the time traveler being there might be trouble enough.

Ideally should not leave lasting archaeological evidence. So, no plastic bags or running shoes

Pick a dosage form and re-package to avoid plastics - sounds doable.

Answer 30

Honestly, in order to make any impression on the archaeological record, you would need to both be very lucky and hand out hundreds of whatever it is you are giving out. Couple that with the fact that archaeologists are very particular with documenting everything so as to avoid site contamination, and you've got an interesting situation: they might find modern items, but those items would be unlikely to spark much archaeological interest, especially if the markings on said items included the date of manufacture. Finding such an object in a drawer of an ancient dresser would likely result in no more than a frantic search through the camp for the idiot who put it there. The only way they would discover anything is weird is if they actually looked close enough at the items to figure out that they have actually aged enough to have been placed there a long time ago.

So, if you ask me, you've got three options for the types of things you could bring: 1) items that already existed at the time, were rare, but which are abundant, cheap, or easy to come by in modern times. 2) items that degrade completely in a short amount of time, like paper, food, etc. and 3) items that degrade very little with time so as to make it difficult for an archaeologist to actually notice degradation without procedures that are too expensive to justify running on, say, a smartphone.

Note that delivering high-tech devices to someone from ancient history is not necessarily likely to kick of a technology revolution. Why? Well, understanding how a computer works takes a lot of complex mathematics and science that simply didn't exist in early human history. A person from that time period could spend their entire life examining the internals of a broken smartphone and never be able to figure out anything useful from the exercise.

Answer 31

I imagine construction materials/items that are more finely crafted but small and cheap could be used. As far as I know, fasteners were not widespread when screws and screwdrivers were around long ago, so a combination of the two could be useful to medieval carpenters.

Answer 32

Flatware (knives, forks, spoons), flashlights, glow sticks, Flintstones Chewables, bandages, hydrogen peroxide, pencils, a metal yardstick.

Answer 33

@Not-a-user Don't take back Bic Lighters. Take all-metal Zippo lighters, which are all metal. After the fuel runs out, they are worthless, so sell them and say there is a time limit on how long they will work.

@TheBlackCat Hydrogen peroxide may be seen as sorcery, but alchemical directions on how to produce hydrogen peroxide (which you sell to an alchemist) should be safe.

A one-page article in one of the 1632 series anthologies gives alchemical directions on how to make aspirin. Hire a calligrapher to produce a version of these directions. Print them on parchment without a watermark. Sell the directions to local alchemists. An alchemical pain reliever should not change history.

Go through pharmacy catalogs to find which medications are based on herbs. A foxglove preparation for digitalis should be relatively easy to produce. Improving herbal compounds with directions from modern herbals (or selling directions taken from herbals) would help your cash flow.

Download some of the books on how they did stuff in the "olden days" and take those recipes along. Something like the Anarchist's Cookbook should produce some ideas.

I agree with the silk and cotton recommendations, though I would modify it to be spools of thread (and metal needles) instead of bolts of cloth. Spools of thread lend themselves to embroidery. Blue and purple are royal colors because of how expensive those colors are. That's why one shade is called Royal Blue.

One of those all-metal potato peelers could be used to produce potato chips. One look at it and a competent blacksmith could reproduce it, so there is no chance of a charge of "sorcery". You are not limited to potatoes; any other kind of vegetable will do. (Germans though the potato was the "devil's root".)

Cut precious and semi-precious stones. Cut jewels are unknown in the early Middle Ages, but they can figure how to do it easily once they have the idea.

Active yeast cultures which you can sell to the local brewery and bakery are another source of income. People depended on yeast being blown in the window for centuries to start fermentation.

Swords made of Damascus steel should fetch (possibly literally) a king's ransom. It is a limited buyer's market, though.

Scented candles and incense, especially church incense, such as frankincense and myrrh, should be valuable, especially to the local church.

Good whetstones.